Patrick Chamoiseau: Return of the Creole By Shelly-Ann Inniss | Issue 39 (September/October 1999) James Ferguson talks to the novelist Patrick Chamoiseau whose controversial ideas have fuelled a raging debate on Martinique’s future
The Bibliothèque Schoelcher: a Library For All | Parting Shot By Caribbean Beat | Issue 146 (July/August 2017) Martinique’s Bibliothèque Schoelcher is a storehouse of history in more ways than one
Caribbean volcanoes: fire down below By Caribbean Beat | Issue 140 (July/August 2016) Shaped by subterranean forces, the islands of the Lesser Antilles are an arc of volcanoes — some extinct, some dormant, some still active. And among their dramatic forested peaks, crater lakes, and hot springs, amateur vulcanologists (and ordinary tourists) can find ample evidence of our planet’s restless energy
Easter fare By Nazma Muller | Issue 138 (March/April 2016) No Caribbean holiday is thinkable without a delicious menu — and Easter weekend is no exception. Nazma Muller shares recipes for seasonal dishes from up and down the islands: Jamaican Easter bun, Bajan-style fried flying fish, and Martinique’s spicy matoutou crab stew
Market day By Caribbean Beat | Issue 131 (January/February 2015) Across the Caribbean, the freshest produce, best bargains, and often the friendliest advice can still be found at traditional markets. Here are six worth exploring, ranging from Dominica to Curaçao to French Guiana
Earthy delights By Caribbean Beat | Issue 128 (July/August 2014) The Caribbean’s public gardens are places to enjoy the pleasures of nature — and centres for research and conservation as well
Joseph Zobel: voice of Martinique By James Ferguson | Issue 82 (November/December 2006) James Ferguson remembers the late Joseph Zobel, a man whose writings tracked Martinique’s progress from its poverty-stricken past to modern prosperity
Uncomfortable truth By James Ferguson | Issue 82 (November/December 2006) For many years, Joseph Zobel’s novel La Rue Cases Negres was banned in his home island of Martinique. James Ferguson explains why
Boy days: Patrick Chamoiseau By James Ferguson | Issue 80 (July/August 2006) Is Patrick Chamoiseau’s Childhood a “minor” work? Maybe, says James Ferguson
Frantz Fanon: Black Skin, No Mask By Jeremy Taylor | Issue 66 (March/April 2004) Frantz Fanon was a brilliant, maverick thinker, a theorist of anti-colonialism who tried to understand the damaged psyche of his native Martinique and the violence that racked his adopted country, Algeria, in its struggle for independence. His writings - especially Black Skin, White Masks and The Wretched of the Earth- are lauded by contemporary postcolonial scholars, but few manage to grasp the complexity of his thought or the depth of his humanism. Jeremy Taylor searches for the man behind the revolutionary icon, and ponders Fanon's relevance to the 21st century world
St Pierre: mountain of death By James Ferguson | Issue 55 (May/June 2002) Once, St Pierre was a centre of French elegance and pleasure, the pride of the French Caribbean, “the Paris of the Antilles”. But one morning the mountain behind the town blew apart, wiping out the town and killing almost all its 30,000 people. James Ferguson revisits the volcano, exactly 100 years on
Back and fort By Caribbean Beat | Issue 127 (May/June 2014) The Caribbean’s history of wars and colonisation has left an extraordinary legacy of military architecture, some of it nearly five centuries old. Recognised today as historic sites, these forts and naval bases are a reminder of the often bloody past that shaped our present
Euzhan Palcy: Making Waves By Bruce Paddington | Issue 1 (Spring 1992) Martiniquan filmmaker Euzhan Palcy directed Marlon Brando and Donald Sutherland in A Dry White Season: what's next?
Four of the best Caribbean beaches By Joyce Huxley | Issue 1 (Spring 1992) Joyce Huxley's personal choice of perfect places to get away from it all. Photos by Chris Huxley.
The birth of negritude By James Ferguson | Issue 34 (November/December 1998) James Ferguson reads much into Aime Cesaire’s Notebook of a Return to My Native Land
